


Real Life

by kangeiko



Category: Heroes - Fandom
Genre: Gen, Yuletide, Yuletide 2006
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-12-25
Updated: 2006-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-11 02:24:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/107336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kangeiko/pseuds/kangeiko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The day the world found out about Them - and it was already capitalised in the media, complete with pictures of green aliens in the National Enquirer - wasn't a particularly fun day for Claire.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Real Life

**Author's Note:**

> For Samantha, for Yuletide 2006.

The day the world found out about Them - and it was already capitalised in the media, complete with pictures of green aliens in the _National Enquirer_ \- wasn't a particularly fun day for Claire. She understood the panic that people felt; sure, she understood, those small-minded, bigoted little - no, she's calm, she's calm, she understands. She does. And it wasn't like she lost everything, like some of the others who had their lives disintegrated on live TV. There was a programme on PBS - knocked up in about three minutes, but whatever - about some kids in Belize, or someplace, that just 'disappeared'. She has a bad feeling that they didn't disappear by choice, and that the villagers staring mutely at the cameras didn't have a great deal to do with it either.  


See, she knows that she's seen those kids before. Two of them - three? maybe it was three, and she doesn't remember - were behind a door at her dad's work that somehow wasn't closed as quickly as it should have been. Her dad knows about her, of course, and she knows about _him_, too, and she isn't too sure what to feel about that. She wonders if she's supposed to hate him for what he's doing to those other kids, or grateful that he's not doing it to her, too.  


Mainly, she wonders if she was actually on the table - negotiating, operating, autopsy - for any length of time.  


There's a funny story there, and she has to go through the entirety of it with a counsellor listening sympathetically while she talks about waking up dead, but not being metaphorical or whatever. And her dad is watching her through the partition, and disappearing for long hours at a time, and she knows that she's being discussed and negotiated over, like a slice of land. Palms slamming into the polished wood of the table and pictures of children and adults and monsters passing hands, and charts and figures and cigarette smoke like a scene from _The X-Files_. There are files, she knows that for sure - she's seen them - and stats next to each name, like a game or something. _This_ child for _this_ project, and _that_ child for _that_ project, and no, no, not my little girl; you stay away from my little girl.  


(In Claire's head, he sounds like he did when... when she was seven, she thinks, when she demanded to know if Santa Claus was made up, and he seemed so upset at the mere suggestion - _no, no, no honey, who told you that? That's a horrible thing to say..._ But she remembers that he never quite looked her in the eye.)  


So, yeah. The 'world' finding out wasn't such a big deal in the grand scheme of things, 'cause the government's known for ages. No - _governments_. (Those kids didn't disappear themselves, and what's the going rate for a telekinetic these days?) But it still mattered, didn't it? It's a stupid thing to think, but it took away that secret she had with her dad - like, back when she couldn't buy her mom's birthday present, and her dad paid for it and everything, and then they spent a week or whatever laughing about it 'cause it was so awesome - and now that secret's out for everyone to see.  


(And maybe her dad doesn't have any bargaining power left because of it.)  


Anyway. The day that the world found out about _Them_ wasn't a fun day for Claire, and she's upfront about that. She's not going to try to rewrite it in her head, and try to see it as some sort of 'opportunity', because it wasn't. It was crummy, but it had to be done, and she'd been expecting it for some time. That didn't mean that it stank any less, but it wasn't for any of the reasons that she'd later retcon, despite her best intentions. It wasn't because of the kids that disappeared, or because she'd been in for testing at her dad's work, or because her mom finally found out. It wasn't even that she wasn't allowed to go back to school, 'cause her mom wasn't about to send her baby into the snake pit.  


(She feels a little guilty at that, 'cause she didn't even think of it but had been worried that her mom would be sorry she'd turned up at all. _No child of mine..._ and she wasn't a child of hers, was she? Just a little changeling left on the doorstep, and maybe her mom would be sorry she'd taken her in at all. _Oh, honey,_ her mom said instead, and Claire's heart clenched. _Oh, honey_, and hugged her, and _my sweet honey,_ and she felt like the lowest of the low.)  


Mainly, she wasn't having such a swell day 'cause of such a stupid little - see, it wasn't even a thing, she's not going to dignify it by calling it a _thing_. 'Cause she knew that it was coming - man, she's known since she found out about herself - Herself? And she's amused, 'cause isn't this going to screw with grammar lessons, or whatever - and so, anyway, here it is, like the other shoe finally dropped. They can come right out and say it now - no secrets about what it is, just about _who_ it is, and some children are born more equal than others... And it's not that she's scared. Her dad's been there for her, every step of the way, and he's sitting on the stairs, and her mom is standing right by her side, and even her brother's downstairs, glaring at the suits framed in the open door.  


"Ms Bennet," the suit says, all smooth government inflection: no trace of accent at all. It's like he came out of a box. Or was hatched. Or something.  


She schools her face into a careful mask of polite disinterest and tugs down her cheerleading skirt. She doesn't even have practice today, and it's not like she was allowed to go to school anyway, but she thought it appropriate. Ironical, or whatever. "Yes," she says, and is pleased at how steady her voice is. "I've been expecting you."  


*

fin


End file.
